biking bits

[jazzfish]

As of yesterday I've developed a sore spot on the inside/back of my right hip, at a contact point for the bike seat. Excuse me, saddle. I'm not sure whether it's a bruise or a stretched muscle. I'd been thinking "bruise" but this morning it started out sore and felt much more neutral after a five-minute walk. I can't figure out a work-appropriate way to stretch it, unfortunately. Ibuprofen it is. I'm not sure whether the saddle needs adjusting, or if I just need to adjust to it.

I'm taking the bike in tomorrow anyway to get a rear fender attached. I rode home yesterday through a pretty good rain. That's still a surprisingly pleasant experience: the rain keeps me from overheating, and not having glasses means I can see in the rain, which is neat. But the pannier and the back of my jacket are both mildly mudspattered, and I'm told a fender will help with the worst of that.

The other thing about biking in rush hour in the rain is that it feels ... unsafe? Unpredictable? Impossible? I get a sense that there's no way I can possibly be sufficiently alert to account for all the cars and the pavement and the weather conditions and whatever else. That it's only a matter of time before something unpleasant inevitably happens. That part is less thrilling.

Comments

[graydon]

If it's only one side, either you're pedalling very asymmetrically -- consciously pushing with the weak side helps with that -- or the saddle isn't on straight. (Or has some other issue, like a high side.)

Tyres can help a lot with weather; disc brakes work in the rain in a way caliper brakes may not. But, yeah. Cars will eventually hit you because they don't care. Still statistically much better than not exercising.

[jazzfish]

Hm. Could be asymmetric pedaling; my bum hip (wallet sciatica) is on the hurting side, and the pannier's on the other. I'll pay more attention to how I ride tomorrow. And have them check the saddle tomorrow when I get the fender put on in any case.

I specifically got the second-lowest-end MEC bike rather than the lowest-end so that I could get disc brakes rather than calipers, for that very reason. Bad brakes are not an experience I want to have.

Cars: eh, well. I'll keep paying attention as well as I can, and either it'll happen or it won't.

[sartorias]

As I recollect, tires can hydroplane in puddles. Otherwise, biking in rain is soooo nice.

[jazzfish]

Eep. I hadn't considered the possibility of hydroplaning on a bike, that sounds terrifying. It's no picnic in a car and I have no chance of falling off a car when I'm driving it.

[sartorias]

As a kid my sister scraped the holy fuck out of her face, both arms, and one knee so badly she had to go to the hospital, after hydroplaning when we rode fast down a super-steep hill toward a puddle to see how high we could splash. I'm just glad it wasn't me, because I had our two year old brother sitting in my lap as I guided my bike one-handed!

In later years, I hydroplaned at a normal speed in a puddle that was deeper than I'd thought.

[jazzfish]

Holy wow.

I am sometimes amazed that any of us ever survive to adulthood.

[sartorias]

As my kids were growing, these memories (and others) would occur at two a.m. . . .

[graydon]

See that mention of "tyres" up there? Check out Schwalbe Marathons. Particularly Supremes for the kind of much-rain commuting you're doing. (Though if you're getting lots of flats, you can move the durability.)

Good modern road tyres -- not racing tyres -- won't hydroplane.

[jazzfish]

Hm, will do. Though new tyres seem ... extravagant? At least for starting out.

[graydon]

I don't know what tyres you've got. MEC probably put something decent on there, but I don't know what it is. The question for hydroplaning purposes is "mountain bike" (transient hard surfaces only, otherwise dirt) versus "commuter" (many hard surfaces, often sheeting with water because Vancouver). You could probably ask the folks at MEC about this.

(Schwalbe is Very Good for tyres, especially very tough tyres. Living somewhere the streets sparkle with glass fragments makes me indifferent to tyre price if the tyres don't get flats.)